


Ghost

by Operator Yaku (TheHonkmaster)



Series: Zariman 10-0 Backstory [1]
Category: Warframe
Genre: Brief Mention of Autocannibalism, Brief mention of Cannibalism, Heavy religious undertones, Mentions of Cordyceps, Mild Descriptions of Body Horror, child endangerment, children in peril, mentions of child death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-17
Updated: 2018-02-17
Packaged: 2019-03-19 16:21:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,269
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13708155
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheHonkmaster/pseuds/Operator%20Yaku
Summary: Part of the Zariman 10-0 backstory.





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Part of the Zariman 10-0 backstory.

“ _Yaku’-titi… Yaku’-titi… Ha-aysca-o’tasa…”_

 _“_ Eh?  _Ah’aaaaahh!”_

“ _Yaku’-titi, da’nisahay. K_ _u’saaya.”_

 _“_ Noooo!  _Ah’ah,_ please!”

“Yes, kiddo. Come on. Get up. Come eat. It’s sunrise, or the equivalent of it. We’re about to make the Void jump and I want you to see it. Come on, up you go!” Yaku’‘s father said, hoisting his child out of their bed. A blanket and Kubrow plushie came with them, clutched in the child’s tiny fists.

He set them on his hip and carried them over to the stovetop, which supported a large, bubbling pot. Their father stirred the thick mixture – containing mashed pumpkin and corn, among other ingredients – and tapped the ladle on the side to clear it of food before setting it aside. He set Yaku’ down gently on the edge of the kitchen table and adjusted their legs to hang comfortably below them. “We’ll get you a cognitive relay soon, okay? Then you can walk around,” their father said, ruffling their short hair before going back to the stovetop and hefting the pot in his arms.

The man was halfway to the table when he collapsed; the pot hit the ground with a discordant  _clang_  and toppled, spilling hot chowder. Yaku’ screamed and covered their ears. “ _Ah’ah! Ah’ah!_ ” they wailed, wriggling and unable to move from their perch.

Their father’s unconscious form shifted and he groaned, lifting himself up on his forearms. He pushed his black hair out of his eyes and squinted at the sobbing ten-year-old.

“What…?  _Ohh–”_ he gurgled, hands snapping up to clutch at his head. The skin on his arms, hands, and face had already reddened from burns and the sight of their father, helpless and injured, sent Yaku’ into another shrieking fit. They clung to their blanket and Kubrow plushie and  _wailed_.

By the time the front door slid open Yaku’ was on the floor, dragging themself around the now-prone figure of their father. They were scooped up by an older teenager – probably fifteen or sixteen – and the two hurried down the hall inside a small horde. Yaku’ clutched the teenager’s shirt with one small hand and reached for their plushie and blanket with the other. “I want my plushie!” they sniffled.

The teenager shushed them and ran faster; all around them doors were being broken through and pried open and children Yaku’’s age and younger were being rescued from the housing units and joined the growing mob. Yaku’ twisted as best as they could to look behind them. “ _Ah’ah…_ I want my  _Ah’ah!”_

 _“_ Sorry, little one. We can’t go back.” And they were right; behind them the adults, once fully conscious, sentient beings, stumbled along and howled as they chased their children.

“What’s your name, little one?”

The ten-year-old paused, watching the empty shells that were once their parents. They frowned and looked back at the teenager carrying them; they couldn’t remember what their name was. They played with the teenager’s locs bouncing on their shoulders and hummed.

“My name is Yaku’.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Part of the Zariman 10-0 backstory.

“Jabali, have the adults broken through?” Yaku’ asked, peering up at the older teen holding them. 

“Yes, little one. They broke through about five minutes ago,” he said, bouncing Yaku’ up higher in his arms. He walked calmly away from the barricade and the eerie silence that permeated the acrid air. There was no doubt that some of the adults would be killed; the brutal beating of fists on the door had lasted for days, if not weeks. The mindless drive to push through the barricade was nearly unfathomable for the sixteen-year-old, who could only watch as the first arm plunged through and swiped at empty air.

Jabali carried Yaku’ to a room three corridors away and set them down. “Stay here, little one. I’ll be back shortly, okay?”

“Okay! And if you see my  _Ah’ah,_ could you tell him I said hello?”

“Of course,” he said, ruffling their hair gently. Jabali turned on his heel and strode back towards the barricade, tying his locs in a low bun and wondering for the third time in as many hours how they all managed to get here. He’d caught some of the older kids – the oldest were nineteen, and anyone older had succumbed to the Void madness – whispering among themselves, talking about the bodies they’d found in the nursery that first day. The very young children, no older than a year or two, hadn’t survived the Void jump and some had simply… disappeared.

Jabali shook off the creeping sensation that someone or some _thing_ was watching him and finished tying his hair back. He rolled his neck and shoulders and sighed heavily. There were an increasing number of anomalies on board the ship, not only environmental but also personal. Jabali looked at his hand and snapped, noting the white sparks that flew from his fingers. It was difficult to focus on the sparks even at their brightest, giving Jabali the impression that they were somehow not there and probably a product of the Void. He hadn’t told anyone about his discovery, but he’d overheard others giggling about their newfound powers.

When the teen looked up he found himself far from the barricade. The room was big enough to hold even the biggest kinetic sculptures. Stark white walls and high ceilings emphasized the emptiness and each step Jabali took echoed for an impossibly long time. The gold-accented stairs opened onto what he imagined would’ve been tiled floors, were it not for the waist-deep water that covered it entirely. Something shifted in Jabali’s chest, a feeling so intense he might’ve labeled it  _instinctual_ if he wasn’t overcome by it.

Jabali descended into the water, eyes glazed over and face impassive. The current swirled around him and crept up his spine; tendrils curled around his arms and fingers and caressed his face. Jabali leaned into the touch, sinking to his knees. For once the water felt like home, like safety and control. He knew that even if he went under, he wouldn’t drown.

Jabali smiled as the water’s surface closed over his head. The floor opened up under him and the current pulled him down, down, down into unfathomable depths. The water wrapped itself around him, flooded his senses, transformed him. It whispered to him as it showed him impossible powers that he could now control. It said to him,  _“This is who you are. This is who you are supposed to be._ _You are stronger now. Take that strength and purge the evil from the universe.“_

This was his purpose: to be an avatar of water, holy and cleansing and unbroken, ever-changing and unconquerable. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Jabali's not dead. He's fine.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Part of the Infestation series.

Yaku’ dumped the bag of marks into the Red Veil operative’s hands and straightened their sleeves.

They felt their eyestalk getting restless, fidgeting behind the safety of the eyepatch. When one of the operatives questioned them about the sudden change in their coloration Yaku’ passed it off as Void energy meddling with their body and redirected the conversation to more appropriate subjects.

They tugged at the collar of their Transference suit – a new one, pulled from the corpse of another dead Tenno. It was free of any Infested influence and despite the itching and how difficult it was to put it on, Yaku’ had to admit they looked pretty good. The calcified flesh on their ribs was a pain in the ass to pry off, almost like a scab that wasn’t quite ready to come off, but once it was removed it became a tasty snack.

Yaku’ scratched at their neck and sighed impatiently while the Red Veil operative counted out the marks and allotted the correct number of favor points to the Tenno. “What’re those for, anyways?” they asked, nodding at the marks.

“I can’t tell you that,” the operative responded without even looking up. “Where’s your Warframe? That Valkyr model. You’ve got a different one today.”

“She’s out of commission for repairs.” It wasn’t a lie; Tsania’dacha had taken significant damage after a failed sabotage, when a Corpus coolant cell reacted badly to being moved and froze her right arm and most of her torso.

“It seems like she’s always out of commission for repairs, Tenno.” The operative finally glanced up at the teen before her, her expression impossible to read under the mask.

“I use her the most. Whenever I can give her downtime, I do.”

The operative watched Yaku’ for another moment before returning to her work. “Hm.”

Yaku’ rolled their eyes and turned away. They examined the walls, the tapestries, the fires, the floor, anything that distracted them from the lack of entertainment. They avoided the captive Infested, for fear of being exposed as one of them while surrounded by those who would eradicate the Infested entirely if given the chance.

Their gaze landed on another Tenno walking in. They had locs down to their waist and moved with a fluidity Yaku’ had never seen before. Something about their face – the set jaw, the strong brow, the brown eyes so dark they were almost black – seemed…  _familiar_. The vitiligo painting their visible skin was new, Yaku’ knew that, but remembering where exactly they had seen the other Tenno seemed impossible no matter how hard they tried.

Yaku’ watched the newcomer, unable to shake the sudden feeling of déjà vu. Their gaze followed them up until Yaku’ realized the other Tenno was walking towards them and they scrambled out of the way. There was a brief exchange of marks and the newcomer moved to the side as well, leaning against a pillar and crossing their arms.

The Red Veil operative counting marks peeked inside the newcomer’s bag and snorted. “Castus, you left Steel Meridian insignias in here again.”

“That’s not my problem,” the newcomer told the operative. Yaku’ squinted at them. Castus didn’t seem like the right name, but they couldn’t think of anything else.

The operative sighed and pushed her chair back to stand. She left the room, muttering, “I can’t believe he does this every time. Every damn time! Is it  _impossible_ for him to sort them out? Apparently!”

Yaku’ blinked and turned to look back at Castus; the intensity of his gaze as he locked eyes with them startled them. “You’ve been watching me,” he said, his voice cool and smooth like a river’s dark surface.

“I– Um, yeah. You’re famil– you look familiar. To me.”

“And you look dead. Leave me alone.”

Castus’ words hit harder than expected. Yaku’ found themself blinking away tears as they took a step back. Their chest tightened and their tongue felt thick and heavy in their mouth. Castus noticed their apparent distress and frowned. “Are you actually going to cry? Come on. You’re tougher than that, Tenno.”

Yaku’ turned their back to him and furtively wiped at their exposed eye. They stared at the wall and silently cursed their traitorous body. “You said to leave you alone; I’m leaving you alone. I thought that was obvious.”

In the span of about two seconds, four things happened: Yaku’ heard footsteps, turned to look, felt arms wrap themselves around their waist from behind, and was hoisted into the air. They shrieked and kicked; their cognitive relay stuttered and struggled to keep up with their brain and powered off, their legs falling limp against the person behind them. “Come on, Tenno! Don’t be sad!” Castus laughed, shaking the helpless nineteen-year-old like a doll. 

Yaku’ jerked an arm back and smashed their elbow into Castus’ face. They beat down on his forearms until he let go and they fell to the ground, their legs folding beneath them. Red Veil operatives turned to watch and one even moved to help the fallen teen, but were quickly driven back by their furious shouting.  _“Cha-a’! Cha-a’! Cu’sina! Cudi’dayut!”_ they spat, Void energy and electricity running under their skin.

Castus, nursing his newly-split lip, watched Yaku’ with wide eyes. “You– I don’t– Wha–  _Yaku’!?”_

 _“Cu’sina!_  Would you just– Fuck off! I don’t like being picked up!” they shrieked, their cognitive relay blinking to life. Yaku’ climbed to their feet and stumbled out of the room, nearly falling over before they got to the observation area. They dropped to their knees, pressed their forehead to the window, and stared into the endless, glittering abyss.

They barely registered the sound of Castus running up behind them. Out of the corner of their organic eye they saw him kneel beside them and instinctively turned away; their eyestalk was beginning to nudge at the eyepatch and they covered it with their hand.

“Yaku’?” Castus whispered, putting a hand on their shoulder but removing it when they flinched.

“How do you know my name?” they asked shakily. “Nobody knows my name. It’s always Ta’sha. Only Tsania’dacha and the Lotus and– and Ordis know my name. Nobody else.”

“We were on the Zariman together. You don’t remember?”

“I barely remember my own  _Ah'ah._ What makes you think I’d remember you?” they snapped, twisting to stare at Castus with one glowing eye.

“Wha– Yaku’, no, that isn’t actually my name. The same way you go by Ta’sha, I go by Castus. It’s me, Jabali. I carried you out of your home when the madness struck,” he reminded them. Jabali shuffled backwards as Yaku’ sat up, bewilderment written plainly on their face. They stared at him for a long while, barely breathing.

“Jabali…”


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Part of the Infestation series.

“Yaku’, I don’t understand what you’re saying! You’re speaking a language that I don’t know! I don’t know what you–”

“Get out!” they screamed. “Get out! You’re not Jabali! Jabali is  _dead!_ He’s  _dead_  and he’s not coming back! Stop pretending you’re someone you’re not! He abandoned me on the Zariman  _and he’s not coming back!”_

 _“_ Yaku’, I– Ya– Yaku’! Please, calm down!” Jabali said, holding his hands in front of him like a shield. “Please, just listen to me!”

“Don’t mock my pain! You’re  _lying_ to me! And stop saying my name! You don’t get that privilege, you– you don’t know me! You don’t know a damn  _thing_ about me!” Yaku’ shoved at Jabali again and a current arced between their bodies. Electricity crackled inside their mouth and behind their visible eye; their eyestalk nudged at their eyepatch like an insistent puppy and they smacked a hand over it.

“Leave me alone, okay!? Is it that hard!? You aren’t Jabali, you’re just another shade trying to trick me, and guess what!? I know better, and I know that you’re not real! _Now leave me alone!”_ Yaku’ shrieked. They scrambled to their feet and ran, not entirely sure where they were heading. All they wanted was to get away.

“Yaku’, come back!” Jabali pleaded, getting up and chasing after them. He caught up right as they were about to climb into their Liset; Jabali wrapped his arms around their middle and lifted them up and away from the ship, ignoring their sobbing and dodging the flailing elbows aimed at his head.

He carried the nineteen-year-old back into the relay, found an empty room, and planted them right in the center of the floor. Jabali stood in front of the doors, blocking any escape. Jabali stood a little over a foot taller than Yaku’ and rivaled a healthy Rhino frame in muscle definition, and even though he and Yaku’ had similar builds that extra height gave him the advantage. Jabali knelt and held his hands out again. “Let me explain,” he insisted.

“Leave me alone!” they yelled. The doors behind Jabali slid open as a Banshee walked by with their Helminth, the Infested creature coming alert and swiveling its head in the direction of Yaku’, whose gaze flicked between the man in front of them and the Helminth. It sensed the Infestation that festered inside of Yaku’ and their breath quickened. If they didn’t get out of here soon they’d be revealed.

“Yaku’,  _please._ I didn’t leave you willingly, okay? I found…  _something_ in the Zariman. A sort of consciousness. It pulled me in and I couldn’t get out. It gave me  _incredible_ powers – it named me its champion, and I know that sounds ridiculous, but we’re Tenno. We’re beings of legend and our very existence sounds ridiculous and improbable if you’ve never seen us before. Are you listening to me?”

“I don’t want to, but my cognitive relay shut off again, so thanks for that,” they hissed between clenched teeth. The Banshee and their Helminth had moved on, but the encounter set them on edge.

Jabali sighed and buried his face in his hands. He peered out between his fingers. “I’m sorry. I swear I didn’t intentionally abandon you. I feel like we were supposed to meet again, and here we are, right? Two Tenno, fearsome and strong and ready to cleanse the universe of all evil,” he said, taking his hands away from his face and giving them a lopsided grin.

The grin faded as quickly as it had appeared and Jabali surged forward, cupping their face. “Why are you so pale? What’s wrong? Yaku’, say something.”

Yaku’ shivered violently and stared blankly at Jabali’s face –  _through_ his face. Their visible eye was unfocused and their teeth chattered loudly; Jabali picked up one of their hands and found it clammy to the touch. He frowned, moving to cup their face again. Yaku’ flinched and their eye focused on the man in front of them, blinking furiously.

“Don’t say that word in front of me,” they managed.

“Which word?”

 _“Cleanse.”_ They said it like it left a bad taste in their mouth.

“Okay. I apologize, and I won’t do it again.” Jabali started to stand, but stopped when Yaku’’s hand darted out and grabbed him by the front of his Transference suit.

“I can’t walk,” the nineteen-year-old whispered, eyes downcast. “My cognitive relay hasn’t come back on.”

“I– What do you want me to do?”

“Wait here with me. You made it shut off in the first place, and you did it twice. Sit down.” Their tone brooked no argument, and even if they weren’t pale and shaking he would’ve stayed. Jabali did as they said and sat beside them. The silence between them grew awkward and Jabali tried to busy himself with his nails, paring them with a small knife. Yaku’ watched the ground with their chin in their hand.

It was Yaku’ who eventually broke the silence. “How can you prove to me you’re Jabali?” they asked, their gaze not leaving the ground.

“I called you ‘little one’ when we first met–”

“And up until you abandoned me.”

“I did  _not_ abandon you. Not intentionally.”

“You’ve said that already. Keep talking.”

“I… Okay, fine. I called you ‘little one’ when we first met. You had a Kubrow plushie and a blanket with you. You called your father  _’Ah’ah.’_ You were very particular about the glottal stop at the end of your name.”

“Still am. It’s important.”

“Of course it’s important. You liked to play with my locs when I picked you up. You were always a heavy kid and I always had to bounce you higher to keep you on my hip.”

Yaku’ finally looked at Jabali, their glowing eye swinging around to rest on his face. “Fine. You’re Jabali, but I still don’t trust you. When’d the vitiligo appear?”

Jabali touched a particularly large patch on his face; it covered most of his right cheekbone and three-quarters of his nose. “I dunno when it actually started, ‘cause I woke up and it was already there. It’s progressed the past few years. I was actually really worried that I’d caught some disease in cryostasis,” he laughed, “I had no idea what vitiligo was. All I knew is that suddenly my skin had these really pale spots on it – small, but noticeable. Nineteen-year-old me panicked a  _lot_ until my Cephalon finally figured it out, after I’d gotten her booted up again and updated some of her software. How do you know what it is?”

“One of my cousins has –  _had_  – it. My  _Ah’ah_ made sure I knew what it was and that it wasn’t contagious or anything. That cousin wasn’t on the Zariman, the lucky bastard.”

“Yeah.”

Silence spread again as the duo mulled over their thoughts and what they’d been through, both together and on their own. Yaku’ scratched at the mess of scar tissue on their cheek and prodded at the healed pits in their gums where their top left molars once resided with their tongue; Jabali played with his hair and flexed his fingers, two cybernetic digits whirring softly as they moved with the organic ones.

“What happened to your eye?” Jabali finally asked, glancing at the patch that covered it.

“My– My eye?” The question took Yaku’ by surprise and their hand went to cover it. “I-it’s nothing. It’s fine. There’s nothing wrong with it. Don’t ask me about it.”

“If there’s nothing wrong with it, why do you have the eyepatch?” Jabali scooted closer, reaching for the object in question. “Here, just let me see–”

“No! Leave it alone, Jabali!”

“Let me look at it!”

“Jabali, stop!”

_“Just let me look at it!”  
_

_“No!”  
_

Jabali lunged for the eyepatch; his fingernails caught on the bottom edge and as Yaku’ jerked back, the patch lifted away. The eyestalk hidden behind it almost gleefully slid out of its socket and swiveled, taking in its surroundings. Yaku’ choked on air as a headache sprang to life and they fell onto their side, covering their organic eye. They heard Jabali scream and scramble backwards, but the pain was too intense for them to care.

“What the fuck is that, Yaku’!?”

“Shut up!”

“No, answer my question!”

 _“I’m not answering a damn thing!”_ they snarled, peering out from between their fingers. “I don’t owe you answers. I know I’m a freak. That’s why I’m wearing the eyepatch. Shit, it gets freakier than this!” they laughed bitterly, pushing themself into a sitting position despite their headache worsening. “You want to see something that’ll really make you  _sick,_ make you want to  _run_  and  _scream_ and  _hide_  like that first day the madness hit on the Zariman? You want to see something so  _horrifying_  you can never purge it from your memories?” Yaku’ seethed.

“I don’t– I– Yaku’–” Jabali stammered, unable to tear his gaze from the younger Tenno.

“Shut up! Shut! Up!” they roared, surging forwards until their faces were mere inches apart. Their tongue unspooled from their mouth, a full foot of writhing, dripping flesh. Electricity arced across their body and a guttural growl crawled out of Yaku’‘s throat to land in Jabali’s lap.

Frozen by fear, Jabali could do nothing but stare. Yaku’ searched his eyes, both of them holding position even as saliva soaked into the man’s Transference suit. Yaku’ spoke around their massive tongue, their voice low and raspy. “Are you going to expose me to the rest of the Tenno, to the Red Veil, to everyone in the universe? Are you going to tie me down and gut me in the name of purity? Are you going to use me as an example of what the Infestation does to a Tenno and pin my corpse to a board like it’s some sort of dead insect to be gawked at? Or are you simply going to  _abandon_  me again like you’ve done once already? Because if you are, I’ll just kill you now and be done with it.”

“Uh, please don’t.” 

“What are you going to do, Jabali?”

“I don’t– I don’t  _know,”_  he admitted, “I don’t– This hasn’t ever happened to me, I’ve never experienced it before. I don’t know what to do.”

His response visibly surprised Yaku’. Their eyestalk fixed its glowing gaze on Jabali and their tongue stopped twisting for a solid second before moving again. Yaku’ withdrew their tongue into their mouth and sat back on their heels. “You aren’t… going to kill me?”

“You’d probably end up taking me with you, and I like being alive sometimes. This is terrifying and I’ll admit that with no shame, but it’s probably harder for you than it is for me. If you want help–”

“Please stop staring at my eyestalk.”

“Right, sorry. If you want help with… this, I’ll help. I’m supposed to clea– to purge the universe of all evil, but that… It doesn’t strictly mean murder. You’re still Yaku’, even if you’ve changed a little bit, and the Infestation is just a virus. It doesn’t really have morals in the way we do. It’s just doing what it’s been coded to do, what it’s evolved to do. The concepts of good and evil, we can’t actually apply those to something that, at its core, doesn’t actually have a consciousness. It’s like that fungus –  _Ophiocordyceps unilateralis_ – that takes over the mind of the host to further its survival as a species. It’s terrifying and it objectively sucks, but it’s just doing what its DNA tells it to do. That’s all.”

Yaku’ tilted their head and regarded the man in front of them with a critical eye; their cognitive relay blinked once and resumed its steady glow. “You’ve thought this through pretty well, haven’t you?”

Jabali shrugged. “I’ve only been aging physically for a few years but my mind has been awake for much, much longer – long enough to figure out more than a couple things.”

“Mm.”

“So? What do you say? Will you let me help you?”

Yaku’ squinted at him. “For now, but if you try anything – if you try to alert the Red Veil or any of the syndicates, or tell other Tenno or  _anyone_  – the deal is off and I’m coming for your blood.”

“Yeesh, no need to be so intense.”


End file.
